River Song (Doctor Who Series)
Professor River Song (born Melody Pond) was a "child of the TARDIS" and the wife of the Doctor, specifically his eleventh incarnation. She was mostly human, with some Time Lord DNA, conceived by her parents, Amy Pond and Rory Williams, aboard the TARDIS as it travelled through the Time Vortex, and then raised and conditioned by the Silence. (TV: A Good Man Goes to War) This gave her great strength, the ability to regenerate and a great understanding of the complex principles of time and space. (TV: The Time of Angels, Day of the Moon, A Good Man Goes to War, The Wedding of River Song) She loved the Doctor, and shared a long-lasting relationship with him. River was one of the very few people who knew the Doctor's true name. (TV: Forest of the Dead, The Name of the Doctor) Melody was stolen from her parents as an infant by Madame Kovarian to become a weapon of the Silence in their war against the Doctor. After a later regeneration, she killed the Eleventh Doctor, but then broke her mental conditioning to give her remaining regenerations to revive his corpse. Before doing this, the Eleventh Doctor asked her - still using the name Melody Pond - to give a message to someone named River Song. When told the message, she replied with, "Well, I'm sure she knows." She then asked who River Song was, and learnt that she was River Song. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler) The Doctor and her parents left her to make her own way in the universe. With no connection to her family or the Silence, River became an archaeologist, ostensibly to track the Doctor through time. She crossed the Doctor's path on several occasions, generally with the result that she was meeting him at progressively earlier points in his own time stream. Hoping to avoid temporal paradoxes, the Doctor gave her a diary to keep track of their meetings and to prevent her from revealing "spoilers" to him about his own future. Again forced by the Silence, she made a second attempt on the Eleventh Doctor's life. Though actually unsuccessful, she was convicted of his murderand spent many years in Stormcage Containment Facility for it — apparently to convince the universe that the Doctor actually was dead. This confinement was made more bearable by escaping frequently to go out on dates with the Doctor. (HOMEVID: First Night, Last Night) She was eventually pardoned, due to there being no evidence that the Doctor ever existed, and became a Professor of Archaeology. (TV: The Angels Take Manhattan) After a final adventure with the Twelfth Doctor which ended with them spending a twenty-four year long night at the Singing Towers of Darillium, (TV: The Husbands of River Song) she died saving the Tenth Doctor, Donna Noble, Strackman Lux, and the 4,022 people saved in the computer system in the Library. The Tenth Doctor saved her consciousness digitally to the Library's computer system CAL. (TV: Forest of the Dead) This data echo desired a true goodbye from the Doctor, and persisted for some time. (TV: The Name of the Doctor) Personality In her first incarnation as the "little girl", Melody was shy, innocent and terrified of the "monsters" who had trapped her in the spacesuit. (TV: The Impossible Astronaut) Her second incarnation, "Mels", was sassy, often in trouble and chased by police just before her regeneration. She resented the Doctor and blamed him for historical disasters, but wanted to marry him. She was quite reckless and daring, stealing vehicles to go on joyrides. Along with her rebellious behaviour, she had a dangerous curiosity that led her to fire off a gun in the Doctor's TARDIS to test out if it had a temporal grace blocking the use of firearms, which was a bluff. Her bullet pierced the time rotor and sent the TARDIS spinning out of control with a great volume of toxic gas pouring out of the hole it made in the damaged casing. Mels also liked to use the phrase "penny in the air...and the penny drops", when people around her were slow on the uptake to realise something that she clearly understood, then finally became aware of the truth. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler) In her last incarnation, River was very strong-willed; though brainwashed and raised to kill him, she decided the Doctor was "worth it" and saved his life, giving up all her regenerations to do so. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler) She resisted the upgraded astronaut suit and refused to kill him, heedless of the consequences. (TV: The Wedding of River Song) River was flirtatious and cheeky like her mother, Amy. Like her father, Rory, she was stubborn, responsible and fiercely compassionate. She enjoyed showing off for the Doctor. She teased him and liked using the word "spoilers" whenever the subject turned to the Doctor's future. This began when the Doctor assigned her to document their adventures in the TARDIS diary. She adopted the word from the Doctor. He, however, used the word with Donna before he met River, establishing that not only he did not learn it from her, he foreshadowed her saying it to him when he met her. (TV: Silence in the Library, HOMEVID: Last Night) She kept her diary from him (TV: Silence in the Library/''Forest of the Dead'') and hid that his death at Lake Silencio was a hoax from everyone except her parents, waiting until the time was right to confide the real fate of the Doctor, without altering the course of a fixed point in time. River visited Amy and Rory after they found out that she was their daughter. (TV: The Wedding of River Song) As she neared Darillium and their adventures were coming to an end, River questioned the Doctor openly on her future, stating that she knew he was the kind of man who would give her a diary with the right amount of pages for her use, thus knowing when it was nearly full, their adventures were at an end. (TV: The Husbands of River Song) As soon as Amy and Rory knew they were her parents, she happily stopped calling them by their first names and called them Mother and Dad. She only used their given names when referring to them with a third person such as the Doctor. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler, The Wedding of River Song, The Angels Take Manhattan) She also learned a lot from her parents. For example, when she was younger, she would back off from the Doctor's verbal onslaughts until Amy's support and push taught her to not back down. (TV: The Wedding of River Song, The Impossible Astronaut, The Angels Take Manhattan) River seemed at ease with being kept in prison much of her life for a crime she didn't commit and often flirted with the guards or made jokes about the facility, even once stating that she was "breaking in not out" which seemed to be a subtle taunt to the security of what was supposed to be an extremely secure prison. (TV: Flesh and Stone, A Good Man Goes to War) She was able to escape from prison "as though the walls aren't there" according to the Doctor. (HOMEVID: First Night) Nevertheless, she did work towards earning a pardon, eventually succeeding when the Doctor deleted records of himself from the universe. (TV: Flesh and Stone, The Time of Angels, The Angels Take Manhattan) She later stated she had "a significant history of escaping". (TV: The Husbands of River Song) River loved flirting with people and was constantly hitting on the Doctor, although she also had a tendency to flirt with other people such as prison guards and Hitler's soldiers. She often greeted the Doctor with the words "Hello Sweetie". (TV: Silence in the Library, Flesh and Stone, The Pandorica Opens, Let's Kill Hitler, The Wedding of River Song) She was also rather vain, believing that her cleavage "could fell an ox at twenty feet". (TV: The Angels Take Manhattan) River was very confident in her abilities and she was very hard to intimidate, showing no fear when faced with the Weeping Angels, the Silence or the Vashta Nerada. She was also very good at hiding her emotions, and didn't like to show weakness. She was devastated when her parents were stolen by a Weeping Angel but unlike the Doctor she encouraged Amy to go to be with Rory and didn't break down after the Angel transported Amy away, showing a far greater level of self-control than her husband, and watching the Weeping Angel so it could not attack them while the Doctor looked away. (TV: The Angels Take Manhattan) River was deeply in love with the Doctor, even though she had been raised to kill him. She teased Madame Kovarian about the mistake she made by kidnapping her since Kovarian was partially responsible for her falling in love with the Doctor in the first place. She stated at one point she didn't fear death but rather meeting a version of the Doctor who didn't know her at all. In this conversation, she told Rory that she lived for her adventures with the Doctor, even ones who don't know they are romantically involved, but felt that meeting a Doctor who doesn't know her yet would kill her. (TV: The Impossible Astronaut) In her younger years, River was rather selfish since she was willing to sacrifice the entire universe in order to protect the Doctor. (TV: The Wedding of River Song) However, as she matured she grew into a much more selfless person and showed a willingness to sacrifice herself, eventually giving her life to save the Tenth Doctor. (TV: Forest of the Dead, The Time of Angels) When the Twelfth Doctor learnt of all her other marriages, he asked River, who had no idea who he was, about her marriage to him. She indicated that she just found him very useful sometimes. However, when confronted by Flemming, she revealed that she really did love the Doctor and never denied it. However, she believed he didn't love her in return which was confirmed by a scan conducted by King Hydroflax's body. River described loving the Doctor as like loving the stars: "you don't expect a sunset to admire you back." However, she revealed she was fine with this and believed the Doctor was above falling in love with people. She also believed that if she were in danger, the Doctor wasn't stupid, sentimental or in love enough with her to be in danger with her. When River realised she just said that in front of the Doctor, she got emotional and claimed she was just buying time. (TV: The Husbands of River Song) River learned a hard lesson when she first met Clara Oswald. Surprised to meet the newest companion since her and her parents' deaths, she asked if the Doctor had talked about her. She was very hurt when Clara told her the Doctor had never talked about River, nor said he had a wife at all. He had only mentioned that he had known a Professor Song. The Doctor never came to say goodbye to her or rescued her beloved diary from the Library on the day it was safe from the Vashta Nerada. She became a guide and helped Clara when the Doctor went to the Field of Trenzalore, even going as far as revealing some secrets of how she came to be. She saved Clara, the Doctor, and everyone else from the Whispermen by saying the Doctor's real name, first muting her connection with Clara so this secret couldn't be heard by anyone except the TARDIS. (TV: The Name of the Doctor) River shared the Doctor's habit of avoiding answering a question by answering a previous question. Like her mother, she was able to follow the Eleventh Doctor's train of thought so well that she could explain it to others. (TV: The Time of Angels) River had varying opinions of the Doctor's earlier selves. She didn't like the First, Second, and Sixth Doctors; she got along with the Third exceptionally well, and she remained somewhat neutral about the Fourth, Seventh and Eighth Doctors, just voicing her shock at some of the traits they had, and her admiration of the latter's TARDIS. She wrote on the Fifth Doctor's short temper, as well as a note to herself to avoid setting the Ninth Doctor off about the Time War, suggesting arguments had ensued between her and these incarnations; she otherwise only elaborated on their traits. (GAME: The Eternity Clock) She had mistaken the Tenth Doctor as her husband upon meeting him. (TV: Silence in the Library) While a younger River liked guns and was seen to carry them often, (TV: The Pandorica Opens/The Big Bang, The Impossible Astronaut/Day of the Moon) her older selves lacked this tendency. (TV: The Angels Take Manhattan, Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead, The Husbands of River Song) River once made fun of the Doctor for using his sonic screwdriver in battle, (TV: Day of the Moon) but apparently revised her opinion on this as she later used her own sonic trowel against King Hydroflax's guards and robotic body. (TV: The Husbands of River Song) Biography Conception and gestation Melody was conceived on or soon after her parents' wedding night, aboard the Doctor's TARDIS while transiting the Time Vortex. (TV: A Good Man Goes to War) Melody's mother, Amy Pond remained unaware that she was pregnant for awhile, as the symptoms hadn't started yet. So she continued enjoying her honeymoon. (TV: A Christmas Carol) Amy was kidnapped during or shortly after her honeymoon and replaced with a living flesh doppelgänger. The ganger functioned as an avatar through which Amy perceived existence as if she was present in place of the Ganger. In reality, Amy was taken to a church marine base on the Demons Run asteroid in the 52nd century to gestate Melody. Through some combination of the circumstances of her conception in the vortex, plus interference by the Silence, Melody developed Time Lord characteristics (TV: A Good Man Goes to War) including regeneration. (TV: Day of the Moon, A Good Man Goes To War, Let's Kill Hitler) Madame Kovarian harvested Melody’s embryonic DNA in order to clone more children like her. This resulted in the creation of River's clones, but the clones referred to one another as siblings. The first batch consisted of seven clones: Lake, Rindle, Tarn, Wadi, Creek, Stream, and Beck. (AUDIO: The Lady in the Lake) The second batch of clones included: Brooke, H-One, H-Two, and O. (AUDIO: My Dinner with Andrew, The Furies) Like River, the clones had the ability to regenerate; however, the exact amount of regenerations they each had were random. (AUDIO: The Lady in the Lake) Birth A little girl lost Mels Becoming River Song Adventures with the Doctor April 22 2011 Imprisonment Dates with the Doctor Return to the Battle of Demons Run Silence in America The opening of the Pandorica Temporal anomalies and the Eternity Clock The Crash of the Byzantium A pardoned woman Investigating the Weeping Angels Meeting the Twelfth Doctor The rulers of the universe and the Kamishi Meeting the Eleven on Syra The Sperovores and Golden Futures A night on Darillium Helping the Eighth Doctor against the Doom Coalition Death in the Library As an echo Undated/unchronicled events Adventures with the Eleventh Doctor Rendezvous with other Doctors or unknown Doctors Other events Later references Alternate timelines Category:Characters Category:Heroes Category:Doctor Who Category:Doctor Who Characters Category:Doctor Who Heroes